PS: Political Science & Politics articles from December 1996

PS: Political Science & Politics archives from December 1996

The APSR Hall of Fame: a comment. (American Political Science Review)
December 1, 1996... Arthur H. Miller, who wrote "10.00" articles in APSR between 1954 and 1994 thinks that getting published in such a prestigious journal is "a feat that should be recognized." With two colleagues he has therefore written an article on the APSR Hall...

Equality versus inequality.(1996 Annual Meeting Highlights)
December 1, 1996... Human beings are fundamentally equal from a moral point of view. They are not, and never have been, fully equal from a descriptive, factual, or empirical point of view. For some of us equality in its moral meaning is a goal, an aim, an ideal, a...

The advent of polling and political representation.(1996 Annual Meeting Highlights)
December 1, 1996... The "modern" literature on the subject of the democratic process began in the 1930s and is by now a huge legacy. I myself have written about it, at least in bits and pieces for half of this period. Given the vast scope of the subject, I hasten to...

The state as a work of art: statecraft for the 21st century.(1996 Annual Meeting Highlights)
December 1, 1996... It is possible that we will never be better governed than we are today. But I prefer to agree with the possibility expressed by Alexander Hamilton in the opening pages of The Federalist: . . . it seems reserved to the people of this country by...

Leaving office feet first: death in Congress.
December 1, 1996... Death is stronger than all the governments because the governments are men and men die and then death laughs: now you see 'em, now you don't. - Carl Sandburg, "Death Snips Proud Men" Charlie Wilson (D-TX) described his decision to retire...

The impact of term limits on legislative behavior: an examination of a transitional legislature.
December 1, 1996... Twenty-two states have established state legislative term limits since 1990 and several others are considering similar action. Legislative term limits, intended to force a continuous turnover in a legislature's membership, can produce a number of...

Choosing Canada? The 1995 Quebec sovereignty referendum.
December 1, 1996... ". . . the battle for the country is not over. And it will not be until we have one." Quebec Premier Jacques Parizeau, October 30, 1995 In his recent book on the many puzzles of Canadian nationalism, Richard Gwyn (1995, 9) notes that more...

The professor's dream: getting students to talk and read intelligently.
December 1, 1996... Spellbinding lecturers we are not. Rarely do students greet our words with mouths agape and heads straining forward in a vain attempt to hear the next phrase, the next pearl of wisdom. Perhaps this is just as well, for learning is an active...

Designing in-class simulations.
December 1, 1996... Editors Note: The following article currently appears as the first teaching article on the APSA World Wide Web site. In addition to the text, the version appearing on the web site will contain two appendixes which include a sample economic...

Brief field experiences: an instructional tool for undergraduate political science classes.
December 1, 1996... Adding a brief field project to political science classes injects excitement and stimulates an interest in course material (Kendall et al. 1986, 11), while exposing students to some of the agencies, professionals, clients, and issues discussed in...

Deconstructing the other: teaching the politics of the Middle East.
December 1, 1996... Teaching comparative politics is an occupation with many built-in difficulties. First, there are problems not simply in choosing which cases to compare, but also in choosing the dimensions along which these cases will be compared. Second, the...

Teaching the Iran-contra affair.
December 1, 1996... The Congressional investigation of the Iran-contra scandal in the summer of 1987 failed as a long-term replacement for daytime game shows and soap operas. However, the scandal itself remained a political issue even after lame-duck President Bush...

Department rankings: an alternative approach.
December 1, 1996... Department rankings are important. The amount of space in the June 1996 PS devoted to presenting and analyzing the 1995 National Research Council (NRC) rankings bears witness to this importance. The NRC reputational rankings provide more than...

A political scientist rides the talk radio circuit.
December 1, 1996... Old geezers sitting around in barber shops listening to cattle market and farm commodity reports, grousing about community problems, and bragging about their latest hunting and fishing expeditions. That's my vision of AM talk radio listeners...

Researching Congress.
December 1, 1996... New faculty or advanced graduate students who wish to pursue research on Capitol Hill, but who lack resources or experience, are often unsure how to accomplish the task. So here are some observations designed to help them get more out of their...

Ratings and rankings: some important but slighted aspects.
December 1, 1996... The several PS articles recently (Spring, 1996) devoted to ranking and rating political scientists and political science departments evoked a by now familiar mix of emotions - feelings perhaps akin to those experienced by Dr. Frankenstein when,...

The strange death of faculty governance.
December 1, 1996... In an atmosphere of "crisis", the American Association of University Professors convened a conference on "Shared Governance vs. Corporate Management", from September 6-8, 1996 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Faculty from AAUP chapter campuses and...